


The Babysitting Job

by wowthatsloud



Category: Leverage
Genre: Babies, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-01
Updated: 2014-11-01
Packaged: 2018-02-23 13:59:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,867
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2550113
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wowthatsloud/pseuds/wowthatsloud
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“So it’s done then?” Parker tugged at his hand for the confirmation – his side of the conversation had said enough, but she just wanted to be sure.</p><p>“Yeah, “ Hardison responded, somewhat quietly but no less gratified. “She says it’s all good, so in a few days… I guess we’re gonna go see Nate and Sophie.”</p><p>Set post season 5, Hardison and Parker visit Nathan and Sophie, and unwittingly become responsible for their baby for a night.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Babysitting Job

 

A significant amount of time had passed since they’d gone their separate ways. Long enough that, for anyone else, it would be assumed that their little unit had naturally drifted apart, as people did over time, slowly but certainly falling away like the ebbing tide of the sea.

And they would have, if they were anyone else. But there was something purely individual about the four people he’d met all those years ago, that he knew they’d always be kicking around at the back of his mind, not always at the forefront but not going away either. A dully persistent itch somewhere in his body that was waiting to be scratched.

Not least because of the pretty, long limbed blonde that still hadn’t left him – literally. If there was anything Hardison could thank their team for it would be Parker. The most confusing, odd, frustrating, annoying, thoughtful, kindhearted, charming, corageous, beautiful  woman he had ever been lucky enough to share his life with. The woman he couldn’t imagine a future with because every moment they spent together was present tense, and once he’d look up from the moments and laughter he’d realise it was many months later and he was ready to do it all over again.

They had been travelling the world again, and hit Athens before Hardison broached the question that had been kicking around a lot stronger in his head the past few days. Parker readily agreed before the words has fully left his mouth; she, too had been pondering the thought for a matter of time.

It was Hardison that made the call, hotel pen hovering over a tourist magazine, open to a page where he drew light circles over the Mediterranean, waiting on the dial tone. It ended, to be replaced by a faint, strongly familiar hello that sounded of a ghost of years past.  
“Hey Sophie, it’s Hardison.” Parker perched on the bed, watching his figure hunched over the desk. “We’re kind of in the area right now, and we were wondering…” As the conversation progressed his features turned from hesitant, to warm, to breaking out into a pleased smile at his old friend. “Alright. Alright, take care then. Bye.”

Hardison set the phone down and stood up to join Parker.  
“So it’s done then?” Parker tugged at his hand for the confirmation – his side of the conversation had said enough, but she just wanted to be sure.  
Hardison took the hand that pulled at his, briefly entwining his fingers in hers before turning sideways to meet her gaze. They held a barely disguised expectation in them, and he still felt that almost euphoric surge when he nodded, saw her beaming smile, with the knowledge that he caused it, albeit somewhat indirectly.

“Yeah, “ Hardison responded, somewhat quietly but no less gratified. “She says it’s all good, so in a few days… I guess we’re gonna go see Nate and Sophie.”

*//*//*/

They flew into Rome without incident, even stopping  to pick up a very expensive bottle of scotch at the airport’s off-duty. It was still a three hour drive to the remote villa though, and Hardison, always valuing his healthy heart, politely but firmly insisted on being the one to drive them.

Fatigue and country vistas meant their journey soon fell to comfortable silence, Parker gazing out at the hills and rolling fields in the passenger seat, Hardison clocking straight ahead, chewing on his thoughts. Evidently they weren’t all to himself, and one manifested into a small noise at the back of Hardison’s throat as a halfway sort of grunt.

“What’s wrong?”  
“Ah, nothing, I was just…”  Hardison waved himself off, but exposure to ordinary folk meant that Parker had already pegged on to the truth – when most people said _nothing_ , they actually meant _something_. So Parker sat there, not leaving his attention just yet, but fixing him with a gaze that let him know she was listening.

He had found it unnerving, when he’d first met Parker. Considered it loaded with an unusual amount of  intensity that set him on edge. But he’d come to know that steadfastness as something that he depended on from her. Which is why despite himself, he spoke.  
“Alright, I was thinking back to when I was talking with Sophie, you know, at the hotel before? It’s been a pretty long time, and it almost quite felt like it has been too, like first she wasn’t sure who she was listening to, then it was like I was the weird neighbour from down the street, then it felt like I was the bank telling her she owed me money, y’know?” Hardison allowed himself a laugh at this, burying the underlying uncertainty that had begun to steadily creep into his mind. It didn’t convince Parker at all, and she remained fixed on him, not smiling but politely engaged. Her lack of response caused Hardison to rush in and fill in the blanks. “But then after a bit she was all over it, talking about how great it would be and all of this. I mean I think it’s obviously cool that we’re going and everything, but for a second it made me think about how much time has passed and  maybe it’s too much time, and what if it’s weird? Um…” Hardison trailed off, realising he had nothing more to say, and snuck a glance at Parker to gauge a reaction.  
She paused to consider, then said carefully. “I think maybe it’s like getting a limb chopped off.”  
“How would that be?” Trust Parker to think of that one.  
“As in, even though your arm might have-” and she used a dark, throaty choking sound in place of a  word here, “You still remember how awesome it was to have an arm. And even though it’s only a sad little stump now, the feeling never truly leaves you. You have the memories, but occasionally, you’ll feel an itch there like someone’s run a feather over it, and you’ll go to scratch it even though it’s not actually there any more. Your body gives you these little reminders once in a while so even if you wanted to forget, you can’t.”  
The poignant image of an armless war veteran had entered his mind, and he had to physically shake his head to expel the overbearing heavy-heartedness that had suddenly come over him.

Then they fell back to their silence and drove on.

*//*//*

They  arrived as the edges of the horizon were turning pink, and the sky above was more grey than the light blue of day.

Nathan and Sophie’s  villa was stunning during last light. The bleached white exterior walls, arch frame windows and terracotta roofing were all classically European, and  the various sections of the house all piled on top and besides each other, creating  the low, angular shape of the house that sat on so many hectares of fertile, rolling fields.

Hardison stepped out of the rental, feeling the fatigue from a full day’s travel but not being to take his eyes off the surroundings.  
“Check this out,” he said, more to himself than Parker, but she wouldn’t have needed the heads-up anyway. She was equally as enthralled over at passenger side, neither of them quite able to believe how picturesque the place they stood in was. It was like they’d stepped into a postcard.

That meant that neither of them noticed who had joined them until she was practically in their faces. Sophie, white cotton dress billowing in the wind like a great film heroine, made her way down the path, a hand lifted up to wave.  
“Guys! You made it!”  
“Hey!” Hardison surprised himself at just how glad he felt to see Sophie again in the flesh, and he set his arms open in anticipation.

Parker beat him to the punch by a long shot though. Before he could even step towards Sophie, she was in her arms, embracing her old friend for the first time in years.  
“Parker, it’s so good to see you! And you, come here, you don’t get to escape this.” Sophie scolded Hardison from over Parker’s shoulder, freeing her other arm to bring him inside. He obliged, and her arm circled around his back so they all stood in an embrace several years in the making.

“Nate’s just inside, finishing up work on something or another.” She invited them into the inside of the house, which was just as splendid as the outside, and excused her husband’s absence.  
“Does he ever stop these days?” Hardison posed the question of his old boss, and in many ways, mentor.  
“You know Nate,” she said, with a huff of exasperation that can only come from the people that love and are loved. “Well the food’s almost ready, and I just about finished setting the table if you two want to eat.”

“Parker. Hardison.” A voice echoed from the hallway that instinctively made them both stand a little bit straighter, then smile as they realised who it was. Nate Ford hadn’t changed a bit – except, Hardison realised as he moved out of the shadows, for the mound of blankets he held in his arms, topped by a tiny, fuzz covered little head. “I think someone here wants to meet you.” Without further warning, he offloaded the infant into Hardison’s arms, no doubt enjoying the sputtering response he formed being caught so off-guard. Nathan smiled at him then, and Hardison realised that he had been wrong. It wasn’t the same Nate or even close – the permanent set of his mouth was no longer downturned, the tension he carried in his back, arms, shoulders was gone, but most of all it was in his eyes. The Nathan Ford he knew had a vicious hardness in his eyes; even when he was being kind, and even when he was being gentle, the rock hard iciness never melted. He saw it was gone now, hopefully along with the troubles that had haunted him for so long.

“Nate, if you want to place a tiny human being  into my arms, maybe next time have a little warning so I can prepare, or something.”  
Nate smiled again, then promptly walked away, going to meet his wife in the kitchen.

“Um, well, hey little dude…” The light blue onesie he was dressed in bore the words ‘Mommy’s Boy’ in large, looping font, which was the only indication Hardison had as to how he’d even address him. Babies had that tiny, unidentifiable blob trait in common, and now one was here, in his grasp, blinking widely and looking as disoriented as he felt. “I don’t really know what to, uh… Parker, here.”  
She had been at his arm, peeking over his shoulder with what seemed like awe, fear, and residual  disgust – a combination people tended to employ watching the particularly vicious animals at the zoo. The expressions magnified on her features once Hardison employed Nathan’s tactic, unceremoniously dumping the bundle of blankets and small limbs into Parker’s arms before she could protest.  
Which never meant to say she didn’t start after the fact. “Hardison,” she hissed, not welcoming of the small, warm package of humanity that she was now in charge of. He had huge, blinking eyes, and they looked up at Parker like she was the only thing in the world. Parker kept her voice hushed as a matter of courtesy. “Hardison, take him back,” she snapped.  
“Nuh-uh, you’re way better at me than this. See, when I was holding him his head was all floppy, but you’ve got the position, and your hands are better because you have all that practice from hanging off of windows and stuff, so—“  
“That’s not the point!”

Nathan and Sophie watched their quiet bickering from the island counter, Sophie with a particularly worried expression.  
“Are you sure about this?” she said quietly.  
“Yup. It’s character building.”  
“But why do we have to con them?” she insisted, getting the last part out in stage-whisper. “Surely asking them to take him for the night would be enough?”  
“No, then they prepare themselves for it. The unpredictability is part of the challenge, plus they’re fighting off travel exhaustion and everything else – if you consider it all this is definitely the best way.”  
Sophie threw her hands up in resignation.  
“Plus,” Nathan added, a miscievous glint entering his eye, “It’s more fun this way. Remember, leave it an hour before you follow me.” He cleared his face when he saw them approaching, Hardison holding his child while trying hard not to look petrified.

“Hey, Nate,” Parker said.  
“Hi. You guys need anything?”  
Parker pointed towards the child squirming in Hardison’s hands. “What’s its name?”  
Nathan opened his mouth to reply, but instead went to fish his phone out of his pocket. He glanced briefly at the screen before nodding at them to excuse himself. “Hold on, I gotta take this,” he said, referring to the phone call nobody had heard him receive.  
Sophie filled in for her husband. “It’s Jimmy. Jimmy Devereaux Ford.”  
“That’s a nice name,” Parker said. People liked to hear those sort of things about their kids, Sophie had told her once. A lot easier, because this was one of the times she meant it.  
Hardison poked his head in. “Is that Jimmy after the original Jimmy Ford, or Jimmy as in James, as in James Sterling?”  
Sophie gave the vaguest smile at that. “After the man who was once his mortal enemy, or the father who only did right by Nate in his last days? If you ask him, it’s neither.”  
Hardison was on the button as ever. “And if we ask you?”  
“If you asked me…”she trailed off, her smile becoming more pronounced. “If you ask me, it’s both.”

Shortly after that, Nathan got off his imaginary phonecall, to explain that he had to go into town to deal with something vague but very important, and that he’d be back in a couple of hours. The front door opened, closed, and he was gone.

Sophie had strongly insisted Hardison and Parker start on the food she’d made, and although courtesy made them decline at first, they weren’t going to fight her particularly hard – not without anything in their stomachs besides sub-par airline food and a shared packet of gummi frogs Hardison had found in his jacket pocket. The chicken kiev tasted divine, and not just because of their hunger. It was complemented by a side of caesar salad for Hardison, and froot loops for Parker.

They had just about finished their food when they heard Sophie’s voice coming back down the hallway, this time filled with panic.  
“Are you alone? Yes? Okay, stay right there, I’ll be down as fast as I can.”  
Hardison grew concerned. “Sophie, what’s up?”  
“Our neighbour seems to have had an accident, and she can’t reach anyone and, well, she’s getting on in age so I need to go and help her.” Her elderly neighbour was, of course, Nathan with dinner reservations.  
“Need help? I can walk down with you, if you’d like,” Parker offered, a similar expression of worry on her features.  
“It’s not just a walk down, the nearest farm is miles away and she’s two houses over. I’ve already started off being an absolutely awful host, I can’t burden you even more.” Hardison and Parker protested her self-deprication, making her heart sink a little lower with guilt.

“He’s been changed and fed so he should stay asleep until after I get back, but just in case here’s the baby monitor,” she grabbed a handset made up with little pastel colours and patterns, and set it in front of them, “and the formula’s over here, so you warm up a bit of water and put two scoops into the bottle—just basically everything it says on the instructions! Um, I’ll see you both in a bit but call if you have any problems!”

She closed the front door on them, and took a deep breath of the brisk night air. Nathan had better be right about this.

**//**

Now they were alone, with the house unexpectedly to themselves. Although there were probably a lot of ways they could have fun with it, both of them were too tired to think of anything concrete, so they settled for a movie in front of the flat screen TV Hardison had been admiring as soon as they had got there. Parker feigned interest as he told her about its specs, and then it was time to decide on a movie. There was a generous selection in the on demand section, and Hardison flipped down the titles to see if anything would jump out at them.  
“How about watching a comedy?”  
Parker nodded earnestly. “Ooh, great idea. Paranormal Activity!” Hardison turned to give her a look, at the same time wondering why he was even surprised. “What? The screaming makes me laugh.”  
“I was thinking more like 21 Jump Street or something? Look, they have a whole section right there we could—”  
“ _Hardison_ ,” Parker pleaded, drawing out his name in that way she knew weakened his defences.  
He rolled his eyes, relinquishing the TV remote and muttering, “Fine. But we’re watching 21 Jump Street afterwards, I ain’t going to bed with freaky ghost demons in my last waking thoughts, nuh-uh.”

Parker pumped both fists in triumph, and jumped up to hit the lights. The only illumination now came from the light of the screen that flickered over them, showing an enraptured Parker sitting beside an increasingly mortified Hardison.

With the time that had passed, he could tell they were nearing the end of the movie, and lowering his guard had been the fatal mistake. Just when the girl seemed to be safely out of harm’s way, a ghoulish presence knocked over the camera, instantly decapitating her boyfriend and drinking his blood. The beast’s unearthly shriek was barely masked by Hardison’s own yelp, which in turn accompanied the hysterical laughing of Parker.  
“Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god…” Hardison clutched a hand to his chest and tried to hold back the tears, while Parker doubled over snorting with laughter.  
“Baby I thought we’d been over that I have issues with seeing these things, I have the thing, you know with my heart and it’s really not helpful when we watch this stuff…”  
Parker was trying desperately to control herself, but couldn’t help a few giggles sneak past. She was close to tears herself. “I’m sorry, it’s just when his head flew off it was like halfway across the room.” She was once again overcome by bouts of laughter, but noticing something in Hardison made her stop, and she gently brought a hand up to the side of Hardison’s face. “Wait, you’re not okay. Are you crying?”  
“That’s actually lemonade from earlier I got on myself, since they didn’t have orange soda and it actually went by my eyes, so that’s probably what you’re seeing right now.”  
Parker patted his chest, nodding along to the lie neither of them believed.

That break in their own noise and conversation allowed them to once again notice the tiny baby monitor placed on the coffee table. More importantly, to notice the sound coming out of it: the faint but distinctive wail of a newborn baby’s cry.

The both of them were up the stairs like a shot. It took them a few turns to find the nursery, and when they did, Parker hit the lights while Hardison scooped Jimmy up from his cot.

He really was frightfully loud.

“Okay, okay, there’s no need to worry, you’re good here now, we got you.” Hardison would have felt ridiculous talking to this baby using words it couldn’t understand, but his desperation underpinned anything he could feel about how he looked. Parker fished out a rattle from somewhere, and Hardison took it, hoping to cheer him up or otherwise distract him.

And he did, momentarily. The noise of the jangling shapes and their colours diverted his attention, and his screams turned to whimpers for a little while. Then he caught on to the con and remembered his real mission there was to cry as loudly as possible, which he proceeded to do in complete disregard of the bright plastic being waved in front of his face.

“I think he has a teddy over there, maybe we can try that.” Parker, thinking on her feet, spotted a soft plush toy peeking out behind a cushion on the sofa that was there. As she bent down to retrieve it she caught a whiff of something quite foul. “Uhh. Hardison.”  
“Yeah, I thought you were getting a teddy? You said there was a teddy!” The mild discomfort was looking more like panic on Hardison, who bounced the baby up and down in an attempt to stop the crying.  
“Teddy’s no good, you need to change him.”  
Hardison stopped his action to stare at Parker. “I need to what?”  
“He filled his diaper, you need to change him so he doesn’t get a rash.”  
“You’d better tell me he filled it with an infinite supply of gummi frogs, because I am not going in there for anything else!” Hardison glared.  
Parker opened her mouth to snap a retort, thought twice, and instead tilted her head slightly and glared right back. It took all of seconds for Hardison to squirm and eventually break under her gaze. The ever-reddening infant in his hands might have also played a part in the persuasion.  
“Fine,” he said, bringing him over to the changing station. “But I’m not happy about having to do this by myself, in case you haven’t realised this about me Parker I don’t have that kind of experience.”  
Parker nearly rolled her eyes at the ridiculous comment. “Who said anything about doing it yourself?” With that she ducked down, sifting through the things underneath to find the essentials.  
On the changing mat, Hardison was preparing to take the old diaper off, pinning the wailing baby’s legs up with one hand to open the diaper up with the other.

Revealing what he saw, Hardison could only let out a long, low groan. “I can’t believe I’m about to do this. How does a kid this small even make so much doo-doo?” Hardison had no idea what he was doing, and he definitely felt like he should leave this task to someone more qualified – Jimmy’s parents, for one. Then he got to thinking, where were Nate and Sophie anyway? Nate was only meant to be gone for a couple of hours at most, and even though Sophie had not specified a time frame he got the nagging urge she was supposed to be back by now. Something else grabbed his attention before he could complete his thoughts, and that something was a stream of warm liquid that had made its way from somewhere down on the changing mat, to the front of his shirt.  
“What the…”

Parker finally found the baby wipes, along with a fresh diaper and diaper rash cream.  She was gathering it all up when she heard Hardison shout “Hell no!” from the other side of the room. When he filled her in, not without incredulous outrage, what had just happened.  
Parker chuckled when he told her, irritating Hardison further. “This isn’t funny, I did not come here to get peed on, it’s wrong. I’ve gotta change this shirt.”  
“Hold on, help me get his legs up first.”  
So reluctantly, Hardison got Jimmy’s chubby little feet in his hands again while Parker opened up the diaper and woah… yeah. There really was a lot of crap.

Two wrinkled noses and copious amounts of baby wipes later, and the baby was finally changed. Parker lifted the now quietened baby up. “See,” she said, sneaking a glance around him at the gratuitous flash of skin Hardison showed before he completely left the room. “That wasn’t so bad now, was it?”  
The baby gurgled a reply, and Parker watched as the corners of his mouth lifted, lifting his chubby cheeks into a smile that melted her heart. She gave him one to match, eventually bringing him much closer, so the soft smell of talc and smooth skin was right by her.

“You’re not so bad,” Parker said to Jimmy. “You’re actually pretty great. Just it’s a little bit hard for you to tell people how you feel.”  
The baby cooed in agreement.  
“Yeah, I get that a lot too.” She watched him, all soft curls and impossibly tiny feet, and briefly wondered what it was like to be so small. She had been that small once, she supposed, but it was hard to remember.  “I try to work on it though. Maybe we can work on it together sometime, huh?”  
He did nothing but make spit bubbles and wave his arms in the air like he was trying to find something, but somehow, Parker knew she’d made a friend.

**//**

It was just as Parker suggested maybe Hardison should consider switching shirts a second time that they heard him again. Parker hadn’t fully gotten him off to sleep but Jimmy had been mostly placated, or at least enough that he stayed in his buggy without protest. Now she was on the couch, toying with Hardison’s shirt buttons, and wondering if he wouldn’t reconsider the idea of shirts altogether on second thoughts, when Jimmy went off. Except this time, it was ten times worse.

“My god,” Hardison said, taking Jimmy out of his pram. “He sounds like he’s been shot!” And at this point he had been around enough crime scenes to know exactly what that sounded like. It was worse enough coming out of grown men, but the noise seemed entirely too big for the little infant, and his balled fists and redness indicated he would sooner pass out than stop screaming. Which seemed more and more likely with the way things were progressing.

He rocked back and forth with him, trying all the cooing and shushing that came to mind, and asking Parker to try all the usual distractions. Rattle, teddy, puppet – none of it was working, as hard as both of them tried.  
Hardison was starting to become desperate. Little baby Jimmy had long passed that point. Hardison pushed down the unwelcome emotions and tried to think, intently, through the baby’s cries. “Come on little man, give me something.” He held the baby toward him and continued rocking, and it might have been the motion that did it, because Hardison finally got it.

“The milk.” Before he knew what he was doing, Hardison was bounding down the stairs with Parker hot on his heels. “Sophie showed me how to make his milk before he left,  something about two scoops and using the machine…”

Parker took him while Hardison shook the bottle, trying to figure out how to properly heat it up with the water bath. There was a dial on the thing with numbers one to five on a scale, and Sophie had said a minute and a half on number two would heat it up enough.

Hardison had heard the desperation in the kid’s screams, and determined that twenty seconds on five would have to do.  
Parker had taken Jimmy over to sit on the couch, and had laid him down along her legs where it turned out she had been playing a game of peekaboo. The sight limitations, coupled with the faces Parker was pulling at him after every reveal, had baffled him into an uneasy quiet.  
“Here, Parker.” Hardison handed her the warmed up bottle as she tried to adjust the baby to a more adequate position. Without the distraction, he had begun to whimper a lot, but then Parker finally got the bottle in his mouth and his cries were replaced by the noise of greedy suckling, beside a long, joyous silence.

They both seemed to let out a breath they were unknowingly holding. Hardison leaned over the back of the couch, head closer to Parker’s, but directing some very important words at their much smaller companion. “My man, your milk ain’t all that to be hollering so much. It really isn’t. One day I’ll take you to Popeye’s, show you what’s really worth crying over, but until then I’m gonna need you to chill.”

Parker turned her head away to hide the goofy grin that had begun to spread on her face.

**//**

He was a lot better after having eaten, but little Jimmy wasn’t about ready to bow out just yet. Parker had tried putting him down in his buggy, and he had started to cry again – thankfully not in the terror-inducing way he had been nearly an hour ago, but with a gentler yet needier tone that said he just wanted the attention. That meant that neither of them were going anywhere until he was asleep.

They took turns entertaining the little prince, Parker continuing a game of peekaboo while Hardison  did something. He was animated enough, but that only seemed to make things worse when they tried to lay him down.

“We’ve got to get him to sleep,” Parker said. “That means making it dark with no noise.”  
“I think you’re right, you know. Seems right now he wants to do anything but sleep.”

So they returned to Jimmy’s room, turning the nursery into a perfect den of slumber. There were no dimmers, so Parker compromised by turning on the light in the bathroom opposite the hallway, closing the door just enough so that only minimal brightness reached them. Hardison pulled up some ambient noises, tweaking a sample of rainfall to emit the optimum sleep inducing frequencies.

He set the mobile down on the end table, then went over to join them. The light was barely reaching Parker, so he couldn’t see much more than the lines of her sillhouette as she looked down at Jimmy with a mixture of wonder and something else Hardison had seen before. The expression pulled into a frown, a quick drawing of eyebrows before he could pinpoint what it truly was.  
“Not quite, I forgot his blanket downstairs.”  
“Where’d you leave it?”  
“You know the table by the entrance where all the keys are? The little stool opposite that, sort of opposite the kitchen.”Parker watched Hardison’s head tilt, the lines of his face screaming uncertainty even in the dim lighting. “Never mind, I’ll get it. Hold him.”

He’d forgotten how warm Jimmy was, and it felt a little bit like holding a small, squirming hot water bottle to his chest in the darkness.  The effect was a relaxing one, and as he slowly paced around the room, picking out the shapes and lines around him as different items of furniture, he began to hum. It was an old tune, carried with words when his Nana would sing it to him which he’d long since forgotten.

Parker headed back upstairs with the blanket, pausing in the hallway when she heard a familiar sound coming from the nursery. She peeked inside and saw Hardison rocking the baby to sleep, and stood a while to just watch. She hadn’t wanted to ruin the moment, and even though she had made sure to stay out of sight, Hardison somehow knew she was there.  
“You can come in, you know.” His voice was a low murmur. “I’m pretty sure he’s asleep anyway.”

Parker moved into the room, holding the blanket towards the dozing baby and tucking it right by his neck. His arms stretched toward her when she let go, as if instinctively reaching for her in the darkness, in a way that made Parker’s heart float and sink all at once in a really unfamiliar way. Hardison set him down, and she pulled his teddy slightly closer to him in the crib before straightening up. When they were sure he wouldn’t stir any more, they left.

“Finally got him asleep!” Parker held a relieved triumph in her voice, and she took Hardison’s hand as they headed downstairs to the living room. “That was hard. I want to eat everything.”  
“We do need snacks for that movie,” Hardison conceded. “And I could do with some.”  
“Yes, snacks. Ice cream and froot loops and mini cheeses.” Parker rattled off a list of foods, growing eager as the feast came to her imagination.  
“Not at the same time, babygirl.”  
“Absolutely at the same time. How else are you meant to mix all the flavours otherwise?”  
Hardison gave her one of those looks again, shaking his head and continuing down the hallway.

"You know," Parker added, frowning slightly, "I'm starting to wonder when Nate and Sophie are gonna get back from their date. Also, why they didn't just tell us where they were going?"  
Hardison shrugged, a small, slow roll of the shoulders that showed his mild bewilderment. "I have no idea. Guess they wanted to keep things exciting."

Parker raided the kitchen while Hardison took a place on the couch. Now the four of them had seen each other again it was like no time had passed, and Parker was back at it again, opening Nathan’s cupboards and taking as much food as she could get onto a tray.

She re-entered the living room and announced herself bearing goods, becoming slightly puzzled when she didn’t hear Hardison reply. She went around to set the food on the table, which is when she saw Hardison on the couch, laid out and completely fast asleep. This time her heart did another thing, but one she could label this time as simply _Hardison_ , and she went and turned off all the lights downstairs too so the only illumination was the moonlight streaming through the windows. Seeing him there had made her own body sag, and realise just how exhausted she was. She really did have to get some rest.

Being graceful and lithe had been her life’s work as a thief, but it came in handy for other things. Normally, Hardison would have felt nothing but the faint, gradual pressure of another person on top of him, but fatigue made her drop her head too quickly, and her blonde hair tickled the front of his face.  
Hardison turned slightly, seemingly still in the throes of sleep, and wrapped his free arm around her body, moving so her face was just at the side of his. This was nice. Feeling his warmth, and the steady thrum of his heartbeat tugged at her already heavy eyelids. She had something important to say though, before she went.  
“Alec,” she said, mouth moving at his neck. She felt a slight shift of his head, so knew that he was awake, even if barely.

“I…”

There was a long pause, where neither could hear anything but the other’s breath, soft and deepening with the pull of sleep.

After a lull, a hesitation, she eventually spoke. “We should sleep,” she said, brushing a kiss against his jaw. Hardison smiled at that. Even semi-conscious, he had a tap on what Parker wanted to say, didn’t want to say, or didn’t say but felt. His only remaining response to that?

He loved her too.

 

  


 


End file.
